The Pride flag has been raised outside City Hall to celebrate International Transgender Day of Visibility.
Please check out all of the stories at:www.OrlandoWeekly.com
Leslye s updates are every weekday morning at 5:10, 6:10, and 8:10 a.m. You can listen to Magic 107.7 live online right here.
Stay on top of Orlando news and views. Sign up for our weekly Headlines newsletter.
Magic 107.7 on Instagram
Trans people are Iowans : Dozens rally in Iowa City to mark the International Transgender Day of Visibility Zachary Oren Smith, Iowa City Press-Citizen
Temperatures dropped. The National Weather Service s Quad Cities Office warned of 35 mph wind gusts. And yet despite the conditions, dozens of eastern Iowans raised trans and nonbinary flags at the Pentacrest in downtown Iowa City Wednesday to mark the International Transgender Day of Visibility. We are trying to let people know that trans people are Iowans, said Aiden Bettine, an organizer of Wednesday s rally and the director of the LGBTQ Iowa Archives & Library.
The day recognizes and celebrates transgender people in Iowa and around the world, bringing awareness to the reality of discrimination and violence that can result from increased visibility and calls for acceptance and access.
Reversing Trump ban on transgender troops, Pentagon releases new policies
Susan Walsh/AP
Stephanie Miller, head of accession policy at the Pentagon, left, speaks during a briefing at the Pentagon in Washington, Wednesday, March 31, 2021. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)
By: The Associated Press & Scripps National
Posted at 10:30 AM, Apr 01, 2021
and last updated 2021-04-01 13:34:23-04
WASHINGTON (AP) â The Pentagon has swept away Trump-era policies that largely banned transgender people from serving in the military and issued new rules that broaden their access to medical care and gender transition.
The new Department of Defense regulations allow transgender people who meet military standards to enlist and serve openly in their self-identified gender, and they will be able to get medically necessary transition-related care authorized by law.
Paulo Batista, a 36-year-old transgender man in San Diego, California, has wanted to serve in the military ever since he was in ROTC in high school.
But that dream always seemed out of reach. First, his father became ill from the cancer that eventually proved fatal, and Batista had to forgo joining the military to take care of him. Then, in 2017, then-President Donald Trump issued a surprise announcement that sought to bar transgender people from serving in the military.
On Wednesday, though, Batista and many other transgender people like him who want to join the military got another chance at wearing the uniform when the Pentagon officially restored its previous policies allowing troops who are transgender or gender-dysphoric to enlist and serve in the armed forces.
The day was founded by U.S.-based transgender activist Rachel Crandall of Michigan in 2009 as a reaction to the lack of LGBT recognition of transgender people, citing the frustration that the only well-known transgender-centered day was the Transgender Day of Remembrance, which mourned the murders of transgender people, but did not acknowledge and celebrate living members of the transgender community.
The first International Transgender Day of Visibility was held on March 31, 2009.
37 transgender people violently killed in 2020
Kelli Quail, president of the Mansfield Gay Pride Association, and Sheila Barone, leader of Positive Progressions and the association s transgender outreach program, addressed the crowd.